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At the end of the day, it’s about the money, about creating shareholder value, as all marketing and customer efforts should be. Mark W. Schaefer. couple of years ago when I started B2B Memes it was my plan to focus exclusively on trade publishing. For me, a journalist, this came as a jolt. Though I liked and respected most of them, the alliance was always uneasy. Use your head. love that! MORE

As a representative of your company, you’re telling customers that you couldn’t care less about their business. There’s been some fervent debate in recent days about the risks of an entrepreneurial role for editors. Note: By the term editor I mean any journalist, whether writer, reporter, or editor.) Does Does being involved in the business side of a media enterprise mean being involved in sales? And does breaking down the sacred wall between editorial and sales mean that editorial must be tainted? admire the plain speaking, but my first reaction was, Are you nuts? MORE

Though Burrell uses never names it as such (a “web version” of “customer publishing” is the closest he comes to labeling the trend), it’s clear from his opening that he’s talking about content marketing: “Get used to it. Because these new types of publishers want to avoid “clunky advertorial, laden with overt brand value and PR messages,” they will be hiring experienced journalists to build an audience of loyal customers. journalists moving into content marketing ) is more than theoretical. Companies that have a story to tell and the money to get it told.. MORE

It’s to draw people in, to provide some form of value that will establish a level of credibility and intelligence that will create a stronger relationship with the brand’s customers and potential customers. If this is what happens, I see it as both beneficial for the brand and the brand’s customers. Jesse Noyes. Eloqua is clearly not a traditional outlet for journalism. MORE

Marketers are often laser-focused on one thing: Get new customers. It ends up being such a focus that any other part of the customer lifecycle gets second-shrift. This can cause a bit of tension, as most of us know keeping customers is nearly as important as getting them in the first place. And then there’s the quotes and statistics about the benefits of customer loyalty , aka customer retention. They usually go something like this: “ Acquiring a new customer is anywhere from five to 25 times more expensive than retaining an existing one.”. Conclusion. MORE

” The trade magazine business of yore was built on inefficiencies, wherein it was difficult if not impossible for businesses to reach out to their customers on a large scale. On its blog earlier this month, the American Society of Business Publication Editors published an anonymous and despairing note from one of its members. In it, the magazine editor described a frustrating planning meeting with his counterparts in advertising sales. To the editor, this was a clear case of sales priorities trumping editorial quality. But that’s not fair. Where does that leave us? MORE

These “walled garden” systems restricted who could participate, and relied on custom-built, proprietary systems that could be difficult to use and impossible to adapt. In theory, closed, custom-built systems can more directly address the needs of the users who pay for the service. Learning an open-source CMS like WordPress or Joomla , for instance, is more likely to benefit individual content creators as they change jobs than would a proprietary or custom-built system. One of the key distinctions in the digital world is between closed systems and open ones. MORE

How pitiful is this: My wife left me alone all last weekend and the most mischief I could get into was looking for research about cross-channel customer views. Let's start with a truth universally acknowledged – that customers have rising expectations for personalized treatment. So, yes, customer expectations are rising and failing to meet them has a price. MORE

This is alien thinking for traditional B2B content producers, notes Conley: “Both trade publishers and custom publishers have seldom felt the need to be great. It has the look of two trends hurtling toward a head-on collision. Content is getting ever cheaper, but to be effective, content has to get ever better. Was hoping to eat in 2011.”. And that means the price falls. MORE

LinkedIn is actually huge for my audience: custom builders, designers and architects. Maureen Alley: Never tweet what you wouldn't say in person. In preparation for my talk in an ASBPE webinar on ethic s next week, I’ve been speaking with B2B editors about how they use social media. Another is Maureen Alley, the editor of Cygnus’s Residential Design + Build (RD+B) magazine. MORE

As befits a rapidly evolving discipline, there is no single, satisfactory definition for this new activity. A few days ago, Joe Pulizzi itemized some of the different ways to describe content marketing , then added, “there are another 30 names for this including branded content, customer media, custom publishing and the list goes on.” But one word that rarely shows up in such lists is editorial. One of the most exciting areas today in the realm of what we used to call publishing is content marketing. That’s a pity. Not that I object to content. who knows? MORE

Changes in customer and buying behaviors continue to rock the very foundations of many industries. According to recent surveys by PWC, Forrester, IBM , and McKinsey, disruptive trends in customer and buying behaviors are expected to continue over the next five years. What remains cloudy for CEOs and their C-Suites is what comprises deep customer understanding. by Yarden Gilboa. MORE

Though content marketing may try to mimic the balance of journalism, it’s an appearance, she says, not a reality: “The real (ethical, if you will) problem with content-solution, custom publishing writing is that it is deeply dishonest to the reader. Over the weekend, one of my blog posts from several months ago provoked a comment that was simply too good to let pass unnoticed. It spelled out the feelings of many journalists when faced with the prospect of going over to the dark side , as David Meerman Scott has put it, by writing directly for a sponsor. Why then does the writer do it? MORE

Compounding the issue today is the prevalent use of the term buyer persona to describe customer segmentation and buyer profiling efforts. The issue I am referring to is the confusion that can surround distinguishing between customer segmentation, buyer profiling, and buyer personas today. Customer Segmentation. Confusion by Adam Gale. Professions. Roles. Firmographics. MORE

If I were still an On24 customer (I last worked with them three years ago) I would be very excited about this new platform. In one of the earliest posts on this blog I complained about the lack of social-media awareness and interactivity in most B2B webcasts. haven’t seen much improvement in the intervening 18 months—until today. Now if only they could supply better waiting-room music. MORE

Over time one of those revenue streams might rise to be dominant, but during my whole career in B2B media the most successful brands I have worked on have made money in many diverse ways—whatever the customer needs. The main metric we will be monitoring in the initial phase is the level of customer registration on our sites. Rory Brown. Neil Thackray. Not at this moment. was born. MORE

Writing the same words twice” may not be a moral offense, he seems to say, but “it will p**s off your editors” and “disappoint your customers.” Jonah Lehrer. For reasons that aren’t entirely clear to me, I’ve been deeply bothered for the last few days by the uproar over Jonah Lehrer’s reuse of his writing in various publications. It confuses quality standards with moral ones. MORE

The bar has now been raised for marketers to make it through the eye of the needle of customer attention. The novelty of content has worn off its shiny coat for many customers and potential buyers. Out Of Alignment With Business And Customer Goals. Compounding this issue, is the overriding benefit of content as seen by customers and potential buyers. Related articles. MORE

” For the most part, he’s talking to marketers, trying to get them to focus on the information their customers need rather than what the marketers most want to talk about: themselves. One of my favorite Joe Pulizzi sayings is “ it’s not about you.” Journalists generally don’t see this as their own problem. There, they mostly point to themselves. MORE

Enabling great customer experiences and optimizing processes and interactions across all touchpoints in a consistent and human, customer-centric way leads to marketing and business success. The customer experience is the sum of all contact moments (touches) the connected customer […]. Integrated marketing customer experience single customer view MORE

And if it’s just you and WordPress, you’ll be better able to customize the code yourself to get the result you want. Last week journalism professor Matt Waite wrote a blog post worrying about the typical defeatist reaction of journalism students when faced with a coding challenge, whether in HTML, JavaScript, or other language: “I can’t do this,” they tell him. You’re set, right? But MORE

Many surveys present a familiar tune: most marketers want unified customer data but few have it. Better tools, like Customer Data Platforms, can help by reducing the expertise needed. So while marketers aren't parading towards a complete customer view with a triumphal Sousa march, there’s no need for a funeral dirge quite yet. So far so good. That’s something I didn’t expect. MORE

The phrase suggested to me one more challenge she might have added: “How to stop thinking of your customers as peons and thieves.”. The longer traditional media thinks in terms of how they can make their customers do things, the closer they are to extinction. In an article earlier this week explaining why she won’t be self-publishing anytime soon, Edan Lepucki paused to enumerate the hurdles facing traditional publishers. The last in her list was “how to make people actually pay for content.” It’s troublesome enough that media should be so concerned with how to make people pay. MORE

What makes this meaningful is the fact that IDG is in essence recognizing the irrelevance of its own media vehicles, at least for some of its potential advertisers. It’s a big step beyond traditional custom publishing, which is nothing new for IDG. In that old model, the publisher is essentially saying to its customers, “You know nothing about publishing. As one of the few acknowledged leaders and innovators in B2B publishing, IDG seems always to know when to act on industry trends. Now the company’s IDG Enterprise unit has announced it will dive into content marketing. MORE

While others portray that if you just do these few things, then there will be a proverbial pot of gold, at the end of the year filled with overflowing coins of new leads and customers. One thing that is clear is the dynamics of markets, customers, and sellers continue to unfold in new ways. by Anton Scherbik. If it were only that simple…. What Should Guide Marketing? Choosing Wisely. MORE

For a case in point, see Smashwords founder Mark Coker’s recent Huffington post article , “Do E-Book Customers Prefer Longer or Shorter Books?” In it, he offers data showing that bestsellers on Smashwords run long, and that “readers go out of their way to search out and purchase longer e-books.”. It’s a handy rule of thumb, but not an iron-clad rule. Tl;dr doesn’t always apply. MORE

For the rest of my customizations, I relied on plug-ins: Blog Copyright by BTE to add a copyright statement to the footer. (I may yet switch to a creative commons license, but the traditional publisher in me still resists.). In my years as a magazine editor, one of the most irksome tasks was writing an editorial announcing a redesign of the publication. The old look. couldn’t use that! MORE

As organizations focus more on customer service, the customer experience and, well, anything that’s customer-related, there’s also an increasing attention for the psychological dimension of business (workers) and customers. MORE

Now before I say anything more, I should mention that in my previous career in publishing I was a Readex customer for 20 years or so. There’s been a minor buzz this week in B2B circles about recent survey results suggesting that paper magazines and newsletters remain extremely important to business professionals. I’m sure it’s true. I’m also sure it’s not very meaningful. MORE

Customer experience has been and will continue to be one of the major influences on how buyers make choices. Recent research by SiriusDecisions found that for 80% of B2B buyers surveyed, customer experience counted as the top significant reason why they chose to work with a specific provider over another. State Of B2B Customer Experience Is Unhealthy. by Creative Stall. MORE

Analysts at Forrester and Gartner have outlined how advocate marketing strategies can spark B2B growth by increasing leads, brand awareness, and customer retention. However, fear of failure still prevents many brands from investing in customer advocacy—especially if more traditional. MORE

When Joe Pulizzi talks about it , I’m ready to leap onto the barricades with him and raise the banner for personalizing and equalizing the relationship with customers through great editorial. No writer can become good at the craft without being sensitive to language. But in other contexts, that vocational advantage can be a liability. This seems to be true of many journalists who resist the benefits of new media solely because of the language used to describe them. They’ve got it wrong, of course. But we should not be too quick to dismiss their reactions. They may be on to something. MORE

There is a big problem when it comes to B2B customer research. According to various studies over the years (by credible institutions such as Harvard) regarding market and customer research, approximately 80% or better of B2B customer research is conducted to reinforce current assumptions about customers. Thus, inundating customers with non-relevant content. MORE

The Customer Decision Hub from Pega (formerly PegaSystems) is certainly mature: the product can trace its roots back well over a decade, to a pioneering company called KiQ Limited, which was purchased in 2004 by Chordiant, which Pega purchased in 2010. Pega positions Customer Decision Hub as part of its core platform, which supports applications for marketing, sales automation, customer service, and operations. It’s another way of bringing context to bear and thus of ensuring each decision is appropriate to the customer’s current journey stage. MORE

We wanted to let our registered users select their interests from a predetermined set of categories, then present a customized home page when they logged in. MUD day 20: Back in the late 90s or early aughts, one of the hot topics in the Web 1.0 world was personalization. On the industry portal site I ran for much of that time, we had what seems now like a pretty lame concept of personalization. We never implemented our plan, but it hardly mattered. The onset of Web 2.0 and social media, along with the impact of Google search, would have rendered our efforts irrelevant. Aggregate. MORE

However, as much as we overcomplicate things, there is no overstating the importance of providing the best customer experience possible each time, every time and across all channels. According to Gartner, 89% of all businesses will compete on customer experience this year. Another 89% believe customer experience will be their main differentiator by 2017. Customer Experience MORE

And if it’s just you and WordPress, you’ll be better able to customize the code yourself to get the result you want. Last week journalism professor Matt Waite wrote a blog post worrying about the typical defeatist reaction of journalism students when faced with a coding challenge, whether in HTML, JavaScript, or other language: “I can’t do this,” they tell him. You’re set, right? But

LinkedIn is actually huge for my audience: custom builders, designers and architects. Maureen Alley: Never tweet what you wouldn't say in person. In preparation for my talk in an ASBPE webinar on ethic s next week, I’ve been speaking with B2B editors about how they use social media. Another is Maureen Alley, the editor of Cygnus’s Residential Design + Build (RD+B) magazine.

” The trade magazine business of yore was built on inefficiencies, wherein it was difficult if not impossible for businesses to reach out to their customers on a large scale. On its blog earlier this month, the American Society of Business Publication Editors published an anonymous and despairing note from one of its members. In it, the magazine editor described a frustrating planning meeting with his counterparts in advertising sales. To the editor, this was a clear case of sales priorities trumping editorial quality. But that’s not fair. Where does that leave us?

At the end of the day, it’s about the money, about creating shareholder value, as all marketing and customer efforts should be. Mark W. Schaefer. couple of years ago when I started B2B Memes it was my plan to focus exclusively on trade publishing. For me, a journalist, this came as a jolt. Though I liked and respected most of them, the alliance was always uneasy. Use your head. love that!

It’s to draw people in, to provide some form of value that will establish a level of credibility and intelligence that will create a stronger relationship with the brand’s customers and potential customers. If this is what happens, I see it as both beneficial for the brand and the brand’s customers. Jesse Noyes. Eloqua is clearly not a traditional outlet for journalism.

Now before I say anything more, I should mention that in my previous career in publishing I was a Readex customer for 20 years or so. There’s been a minor buzz this week in B2B circles about recent survey results suggesting that paper magazines and newsletters remain extremely important to business professionals. I’m sure it’s true. I’m also sure it’s not very meaningful.

For the rest of my customizations, I relied on plug-ins: Blog Copyright by BTE to add a copyright statement to the footer. (I may yet switch to a creative commons license, but the traditional publisher in me still resists.). In my years as a magazine editor, one of the most irksome tasks was writing an editorial announcing a redesign of the publication. The old look. couldn’t use that!

The phrase suggested to me one more challenge she might have added: “How to stop thinking of your customers as peons and thieves.”. The longer traditional media thinks in terms of how they can make their customers do things, the closer they are to extinction. In an article earlier this week explaining why she won’t be self-publishing anytime soon, Edan Lepucki paused to enumerate the hurdles facing traditional publishers. The last in her list was “how to make people actually pay for content.” It’s troublesome enough that media should be so concerned with how to make people pay.

If I were still an On24 customer (I last worked with them three years ago) I would be very excited about this new platform. In one of the earliest posts on this blog I complained about the lack of social-media awareness and interactivity in most B2B webcasts. haven’t seen much improvement in the intervening 18 months—until today. Now if only they could supply better waiting-room music.

This is alien thinking for traditional B2B content producers, notes Conley: “Both trade publishers and custom publishers have seldom felt the need to be great. It has the look of two trends hurtling toward a head-on collision. Content is getting ever cheaper, but to be effective, content has to get ever better. Was hoping to eat in 2011.”. And that means the price falls.

We wanted to let our registered users select their interests from a predetermined set of categories, then present a customized home page when they logged in. MUD day 20: Back in the late 90s or early aughts, one of the hot topics in the Web 1.0 world was personalization. On the industry portal site I ran for much of that time, we had what seems now like a pretty lame concept of personalization. We never implemented our plan, but it hardly mattered. The onset of Web 2.0 and social media, along with the impact of Google search, would have rendered our efforts irrelevant. Aggregate.

And they expect an optimized customer experience from end to end. Manage the customer experience: great content alone won't save a lousy product or cumbersome experience. always make more content, their customers can't make any more time. will be forced to value "fit" over "reach" where they target the customers that fit. or current customer is. B2B Marketing.

Writing the same words twice” may not be a moral offense, he seems to say, but “it will p**s off your editors” and “disappoint your customers.” Jonah Lehrer. For reasons that aren’t entirely clear to me, I’ve been deeply bothered for the last few days by the uproar over Jonah Lehrer’s reuse of his writing in various publications. It confuses quality standards with moral ones.

It’s to draw people in, to provide some form of value that will establish a level of credibility and intelligence that will create a stronger relationship with the brand’s customers and potential customers. If this is what happens, I see it as both beneficial for the brand and the brand’s customers. Jesse Noyes. Eloqua is clearly not a traditional outlet for journalism.

Now before I say anything more, I should mention that in my previous career in publishing I was a Readex customer for 20 years or so. There’s been a minor buzz this week in B2B circles about recent survey results suggesting that paper magazines and newsletters remain extremely important to business professionals. I’m sure it’s true. I’m also sure it’s not very meaningful.

For the rest of my customizations, I relied on plug-ins: Blog Copyright by BTE to add a copyright statement to the footer. (I may yet switch to a creative commons license, but the traditional publisher in me still resists.). In my years as a magazine editor, one of the most irksome tasks was writing an editorial announcing a redesign of the publication. The old look. couldn’t use that!

For a case in point, see Smashwords founder Mark Coker’s recent Huffington post article , “Do E-Book Customers Prefer Longer or Shorter Books?” In it, he offers data showing that bestsellers on Smashwords run long, and that “readers go out of their way to search out and purchase longer e-books.”. It’s a handy rule of thumb, but not an iron-clad rule. Tl;dr doesn’t always apply.

When Joe Pulizzi talks about it , I’m ready to leap onto the barricades with him and raise the banner for personalizing and equalizing the relationship with customers through great editorial. No writer can become good at the craft without being sensitive to language. But in other contexts, that vocational advantage can be a liability. This seems to be true of many journalists who resist the benefits of new media solely because of the language used to describe them. They’ve got it wrong, of course. But we should not be too quick to dismiss their reactions. They may be on to something.

” For the most part, he’s talking to marketers, trying to get them to focus on the information their customers need rather than what the marketers most want to talk about: themselves. One of my favorite Joe Pulizzi sayings is “ it’s not about you.” Journalists generally don’t see this as their own problem. There, they mostly point to themselves.

Over time one of those revenue streams might rise to be dominant, but during my whole career in B2B media the most successful brands I have worked on have made money in many diverse ways—whatever the customer needs. The main metric we will be monitoring in the initial phase is the level of customer registration on our sites. Rory Brown. Neil Thackray. Not at this moment. was born.

These “walled garden” systems restricted who could participate, and relied on custom-built, proprietary systems that could be difficult to use and impossible to adapt. In theory, closed, custom-built systems can more directly address the needs of the users who pay for the service. Learning an open-source CMS like WordPress or Joomla , for instance, is more likely to benefit individual content creators as they change jobs than would a proprietary or custom-built system. One of the key distinctions in the digital world is between closed systems and open ones.

As befits a rapidly evolving discipline, there is no single, satisfactory definition for this new activity. A few days ago, Joe Pulizzi itemized some of the different ways to describe content marketing , then added, “there are another 30 names for this including branded content, customer media, custom publishing and the list goes on.” But one word that rarely shows up in such lists is editorial. One of the most exciting areas today in the realm of what we used to call publishing is content marketing. That’s a pity. Not that I object to content. who knows?

As a representative of your company, you’re telling customers that you couldn’t care less about their business. There’s been some fervent debate in recent days about the risks of an entrepreneurial role for editors. Note: By the term editor I mean any journalist, whether writer, reporter, or editor.) Does Does being involved in the business side of a media enterprise mean being involved in sales? And does breaking down the sacred wall between editorial and sales mean that editorial must be tainted? admire the plain speaking, but my first reaction was, Are you nuts?

Though Burrell uses never names it as such (a “web version” of “customer publishing” is the closest he comes to labeling the trend), it’s clear from his opening that he’s talking about content marketing: “Get used to it. Because these new types of publishers want to avoid “clunky advertorial, laden with overt brand value and PR messages,” they will be hiring experienced journalists to build an audience of loyal customers. journalists moving into content marketing ) is more than theoretical. Companies that have a story to tell and the money to get it told..

What makes this meaningful is the fact that IDG is in essence recognizing the irrelevance of its own media vehicles, at least for some of its potential advertisers. It’s a big step beyond traditional custom publishing, which is nothing new for IDG. In that old model, the publisher is essentially saying to its customers, “You know nothing about publishing. As one of the few acknowledged leaders and innovators in B2B publishing, IDG seems always to know when to act on industry trends. Now the company’s IDG Enterprise unit has announced it will dive into content marketing.

Though content marketing may try to mimic the balance of journalism, it’s an appearance, she says, not a reality: “The real (ethical, if you will) problem with content-solution, custom publishing writing is that it is deeply dishonest to the reader. Over the weekend, one of my blog posts from several months ago provoked a comment that was simply too good to let pass unnoticed. It spelled out the feelings of many journalists when faced with the prospect of going over to the dark side , as David Meerman Scott has put it, by writing directly for a sponsor. Why then does the writer do it?

Compounding the issue today is the prevalent use of the term buyer persona to describe customer segmentation and buyer profiling efforts. The issue I am referring to is the confusion that can surround distinguishing between customer segmentation, buyer profiling, and buyer personas today. Customer Segmentation. Confusion by Adam Gale. Professions. Roles. Firmographics.

Enabling great customer experiences and optimizing processes and interactions across all touchpoints in a consistent and human, customer-centric way leads to marketing and business success. The customer experience is the sum of all contact moments (touches) the connected customer […]. Integrated marketing customer experience single customer view

And they expect an optimized customer experience from end to end. Manage the customer experience: great content alone won't save a lousy product or cumbersome experience. always make more content, their customers can't make any more time. will be forced to value "fit" over "reach" where they target the customers that fit. or current customer is. B2B Marketing.

There is a big problem when it comes to B2B customer research. According to various studies over the years (by credible institutions such as Harvard) regarding market and customer research, approximately 80% or better of B2B customer research is conducted to reinforce current assumptions about customers. Thus, inundating customers with non-relevant content.

Many surveys present a familiar tune: most marketers want unified customer data but few have it. Better tools, like Customer Data Platforms, can help by reducing the expertise needed. So while marketers aren't parading towards a complete customer view with a triumphal Sousa march, there’s no need for a funeral dirge quite yet. So far so good. That’s something I didn’t expect.

Changes in customer and buying behaviors continue to rock the very foundations of many industries. According to recent surveys by PWC, Forrester, IBM , and McKinsey, disruptive trends in customer and buying behaviors are expected to continue over the next five years. What remains cloudy for CEOs and their C-Suites is what comprises deep customer understanding. by Yarden Gilboa.

However, as much as we overcomplicate things, there is no overstating the importance of providing the best customer experience possible each time, every time and across all channels. According to Gartner, 89% of all businesses will compete on customer experience this year. Another 89% believe customer experience will be their main differentiator by 2017. Customer Experience

And they expect an optimized customer experience from end to end. Manage the customer experience: great content alone won't save a lousy product or cumbersome experience. always make more content, their customers can't make any more time. will be forced to value "fit" over "reach" where they target the customers that fit. or current customer is. B2B Marketing.

While others portray that if you just do these few things, then there will be a proverbial pot of gold, at the end of the year filled with overflowing coins of new leads and customers. One thing that is clear is the dynamics of markets, customers, and sellers continue to unfold in new ways. by Anton Scherbik. If it were only that simple…. What Should Guide Marketing? Choosing Wisely.

The bar has now been raised for marketers to make it through the eye of the needle of customer attention. The novelty of content has worn off its shiny coat for many customers and potential buyers. Out Of Alignment With Business And Customer Goals. Compounding this issue, is the overriding benefit of content as seen by customers and potential buyers. Related articles.

Customer experience has been and will continue to be one of the major influences on how buyers make choices. Recent research by SiriusDecisions found that for 80% of B2B buyers surveyed, customer experience counted as the top significant reason why they chose to work with a specific provider over another. State Of B2B Customer Experience Is Unhealthy. by Creative Stall.

Analysts at Forrester and Gartner have outlined how advocate marketing strategies can spark B2B growth by increasing leads, brand awareness, and customer retention. However, fear of failure still prevents many brands from investing in customer advocacy—especially if more traditional.

How pitiful is this: My wife left me alone all last weekend and the most mischief I could get into was looking for research about cross-channel customer views. Let's start with a truth universally acknowledged – that customers have rising expectations for personalized treatment. So, yes, customer expectations are rising and failing to meet them has a price.

The Customer Decision Hub from Pega (formerly PegaSystems) is certainly mature: the product can trace its roots back well over a decade, to a pioneering company called KiQ Limited, which was purchased in 2004 by Chordiant, which Pega purchased in 2010. Pega positions Customer Decision Hub as part of its core platform, which supports applications for marketing, sales automation, customer service, and operations. It’s another way of bringing context to bear and thus of ensuring each decision is appropriate to the customer’s current journey stage.

As organizations focus more on customer service, the customer experience and, well, anything that’s customer-related, there’s also an increasing attention for the psychological dimension of business (workers) and customers.

Marketers are often laser-focused on one thing: Get new customers. It ends up being such a focus that any other part of the customer lifecycle gets second-shrift. This can cause a bit of tension, as most of us know keeping customers is nearly as important as getting them in the first place. And then there’s the quotes and statistics about the benefits of customer loyalty , aka customer retention. They usually go something like this: “ Acquiring a new customer is anywhere from five to 25 times more expensive than retaining an existing one.”. Conclusion.